aayoungno death
represents a single loss
it is a lifetime of little ones
i didn’t just lose my father
i lost his voice
his cologne
him beaming as i accepted my diploma
the father daughter dance at my wedding
him teaching my sons to fish
family reunions under catalpa trees
but i remember the way he laughed
it was left behind in his grandsons eyes
and in
their gleeful bellies
his joy rising from the deep
it is simply
my favorite mercy
I thought
I understood what
love
truth
and beauty
were
until I saw the smile
beam from the face
of my son
taking
his leading role bows
before the applauding theatre
as he realized
he had just achieved
something
he never thought possible
perhaps i should preface this
by saying this is not a sobriety poem
.
i didn’t decide to stop drinking
because i hit rock bottom
i decided to quit drinking
because i am headed for the top
.
i’ve never woken up beneath an
underpass raped with no memory
or panties
.
never had a dui from a Christmas party
gone wild
.
my liver isn’t about to change its name
to Larry Hagman
.
i decided to quit drinking
to break the family curse
to honor my father and friends
.
i am attending AA meetings
to model good behavior
for my children
.
who
better understands
than the child
or spouse
of a writer
the way someone can exist
in a state of absence
yet be seated in the next room
perhaps if i worked downtown
left everyday in a nursing uniform
or struck out at 3 a.m.
in my old mortician’s black suit
my vocation
wouldn’t seem so intrusive
i should install a barber’s pole
outside my office door
wear a leather apron
scream show tunes
and keep jars of leeches
there was no part of me
that could find the will
to protest
when the 18 year old
blue mohawk girl
with a screaming sticky-dirty baby
on her hip
and more metal in her face
than a tackle box
cut me off
in the u-scan lane
at the super market
all i could muster was pathos
as she began charging her dreams away
one baby food jar at a time
i know her
i’ve been her
either daddy didn’t love her enough
or
he loved her
a little too much
having twin teenagers with autism
is and will be
the greatest challenge of my life
if i survive this
i can whip anything
see
there are days when it’s hard to tell
who is screaming at you
the autism
or the 18 year old asshole
their teeth come out
bile and vomit spray the walls
over being asked to pick up their dirty socks
it is then i remember there is a tall bridge
perfect for giving up
right down the road from my house
and i think of what would happen
in my horrid wake
the abusive father the only one left
to care for them
the equivalent of throwing them to the wolves
romulus and remus made flesh
death is just another luxury a single mother can’t afford
besides
not loving them enough to stay alive…
that isn’t me
that’s what my father would do
i am a single mother
of 18 year old twin boys
who have autism
attention deficit disorder
and bi-polar disorder
divorced their con-man father
after 8 years of marriage
at age 26
because i had grown up
and was fed up
with his backward
abusive ways
realizing he was a pedophile
who groomed me for three years
as a child
before i caved in
to his disease
after ten years
as a mortician
a lifetime as a poet
and a childhood as a southern baptist
i am convinced there is no god
or if there is
he isn’t concerned with me
but that’s okay
i’ve survived
more than that
i’ve kicked ass
i don’t need him to be
my mother
reads her computer screen
wincing at my words
some days
but then
she smiles
remembering who my parents are
knowing i am a living monument
to her wilder ways
today
would be your 73rd birthday
had you lived to see it
but we both know
it’s for the best
you didn’t
i spent the first three decades of life
with your absence
occupying the most space in my every room
but i am older and wiser now, daddy
and i have tasted your black pain
realizing it was a merciful death
you stopped hurting
yourself
and everyone who loved you
we learned
to ache for you in another way
but thank you for making it 44 years
and leaving me your swagger
you are the beautiful bastard
who put the wicked in my ways
please know
they’re growing up well
in spite of you
…and the lack of you
boys who stand taller
than shadows cast